_ Meg walked back to her family rubbing her temples. Ovit's had gone home early, figuring no one would notice or care, Copper was out on guard duty, which left Turnbull in charge. He had yammered on about this cheese factory thing, until she felt like slapping him, which of course she couldn't do because he was on the phone. After about ten minutes she was finally able to discover that she had no messages. She asked for Fraser as well while she was on the phone, which brought up a horrible Morel dilemma for poor Turnbull. He thought it would be a breach of the Constable's privacy for him to give his messages to the inspector, however if she ordered him too he would be put in a position where he would have to judge weather his duty or his morality was more important. Meg decided it wasn't worth the hassle and just hung up. When she got back to her family Will and Cimon were arguing with there grandparents.
"I can't believe this!" Will practically yelled. "I mean it's stupid."
"William," her mother said angrily. "You are not in a position to judge this decision."
"What decision?" Meg asked, assuming it was something to do with the nights itinerary.
"They threw Constable Fraser out!" Cimon said, he was a livid as his brother.
"What?"
"Margaret," her mother said in an excruciatingly motherly voice. "You have to learn that . . . that sort of behavior is not you're cross to bear."
"Behavior?"
"Constable Fraser's gazes were totally inappropriate. While that sort of attention may be flattering it has no place in the Royal Canadian Mounted police."
Suddenly, Meg understood. She was furious at them, for assuming that Fraser's gazes were unwanted, or even inappropriate. She had worn a red sweater that day with the hope he would notice. Truth be told, there were several times she worried that she was harassing him. She often had to check her responses, and guard her words. And it wasn't because she was afraid of Ottawa, of being reported, she knew he had one of those gentlemanly mindsets that would inhibit him from telling anyone, no matter what she did. No, she didn't want to hurt him, or pressure him. She had been hurt by sexual harassment before, it had marred her career, and worse it had made her doubt herself, she wouldn't do that to him. Nor would she want him to think that he would be better off if he loved her. She only wanted his affections if they were genuine.
As mad as she was, she did realize that they were being parents, protecting their only daughter. She couldn't hold that against them.
"They just threw him out!" Cimon explained. Will was too busy brooding to say a word. "I mean it looked like he had been shot or something!"
"Don't Exaggerate, Cimon," his Grandmother scolded.
"How are we going to get around tomorrow, Hun? You think of that?" Will demanded.
"William, don't you dare take that tone of voice with us!" His grandmother said, with an authority he could not deny.
"Margaret can arrange some other escort, can't you dear?" Her father asked.
Meg didn't know what to say to her father, she could get Cooper or Turnbull to drive the kids around, that wouldn't be a problem. But she didn't want them to do it, she wanted Fraser.
Diefenbaker barked.
"He left his dog." Inspector Thatcher said, half out of annoyance, half out of relief.
"It's a wolf." Cimon corrected.
"You're not upset are you Margaret?" Her mother asked, something in the way she had changed the subject tipped the elder Thacther off.
"No, mother, it's just a hassle."
"We didn't make trouble for you, you understand, It's just that . . ."
"No, no, I know exactly what you were trying to do, and thank you for the thought, but . . ." She looked around the hotel uneasily. But what? But she was in love with her subordinate? But she would rather spend the night alone with him than with them? But they had been insensitive and thoughtless? "What are we going to do for the rest of the night? We can't go anywhere with the wolf, and he can't stay here."
"Dog's can find their own way home." Xerxes interjected, less than helpfully.
"Like in that one movie," Leo added.
Her mother nodded. "You really shouldn't worry about it, Margaret. It's a wolf for God sake, I'm sure it can take care of itself."
Under normal circumstances Meg would have agreed, but these circumstances were hardly normal. "No Mother, I have a responsibility to Constable Fraser. He was kind enough to aid us all day. We could at least be kind enough to get his wolf home safely."
"Margaret I think you're acting irrationally." Her father said, warning in his voice. Throughout her teenage years she had dreaded that phrase from her father. Neither of her parents ever told her what to do, or what they thought, But her father had branded every action he disapproved of as irrational. At first she took his word for it, then she became stubborn and fought to rationalize every action. (She constructed a whole Aristotelian argument to prove to him that joining the RCMP was not irrational.) But now Meg was an adult, an Inspector, she didn't need her father's approval to act.
"If I am, that's my prerogative." She said sharply. Turning to the wolf she said, "Come." With that she pivoted and started to storm out the door. Her parents watched her go without saying anything. If their daughter was going to be stupid and make a fool of herself, they weren't going to stop her.
"Auntie Meg!" Elly called, having to run to catch up with the annoyed Inspector.
"Elly," Meg said looking down at the little girl who had to jog to keep up. "Maybe you should stay with your Grandparents tonight."
"But all my stuff is at your place."
"Elly . . ."
"Pleas auntie Meg, pleas. I can take care of Diefenbaker while you look for Constable Fraser. I'll be a big help, I promise."
Meg wanted to say no, but she couldn't resist those big green eyes.
***
"No!" Franny yelled. "No no no! You can not barrow fifty dollars."
"Stop yellin'!" Tony yelled right back. "It's for Maria's birthday."
"It's tomorrow! What can you possibly get her in the next three hours all the stores are closed."
"There's this guy I know . . ."
"Like the guy who sells house coat's out of his trunk?" Franny asked accusingly.
"Look you gonna give me the money or not?"
"Where does all you're money go? You have a job too!"
"Who do you think buys the food in this house?"
"Me!"
"Pay's the bills?"
"Ray!"
Tony paused for a moment. "Look, all I'm asking is fifty till pay day."
Franny sighed, resigned that he would nag her until she said yes. "Fine," She groaned. "But all I can spare is thirty. I got a date tomorrow."
"Thirty, yha tha'd be good. You're the Greatest Franny, I owe you one."
"Yha," Franny mused. "You owe me about eighteen."
At that moment the doorbell rang.
"Someone get that!" Their Ma yelled from the kitchen. She was cooking and she didn't like to leave the kitchen, despite the fact she was by far the closest one to the front door.
Franny sighed, again, and started heading towards the front door.
"What about the Money?" Tony demanded.
"What you can't wait a minute." Franny yelled over her shoulder as she bounded down the stairway.
"Come On! Maria's Birthday is in, like, an hour."
"Cool you're jets!" Franny yelled as she fiddled with the lock on the door. Finally she managed to open it and was shocked by what she saw.
A beautiful woman and a cute little girl were standing at her doorway. Both looked like they were absolutely frozen through, which didn't surprise Franchisca as it was a bitterly cold night for mid-September.
"Can I talk to Ray Vecchio please?" The woman asked, her voice was hard, but trembling ever so slightly from the cold.
"You know him?"
The woman took a deep breath. "Yes."
"You his, ah, friend, girl-friend?"
"No." The woman said harshly.
"Franchesca!" Ma Vecchio Yelled as she poked her head out of the kitchen. "Invite Ray's friends in out of the cold."
"Yha Ma!" Franny yelled. Her head was turned so she didn't see the woman wince. She turned back to the freezing pair in the doorway. "Won't you come in." she said sweetly.
Elly didn't need to be asked twice. The little girl practically ran into the warm house with the wonderful smells emanating from the kitchen. The woman followed at a more conservative pace, and before Franny could shut the door, Diefenbaker slipped in. "Hay, isn't that?"
"Constable Fraser's wolf." Meg said crisply. "I'm actually looking for him."
"Well the wolf's right there . . ." Franny said, surprised that the obvious hadn't accrued to the woman.
"Not the wolf, Constable Fraser." Meg said, with admirable patients. "You wouldn't happen to know where he is would you?"
"Your . . . your not his, ah, girlfriend are you?" Franny asked, almost fearful of the answer.
"No," Meg snapped, a little quicker than was necessary. Realizing that, she cleared her thought and said nicely, "I'm Inspector Meg Thatcher. Constable Fraser's superior officer."
By this time Elly and Ma Vecchio had found each other. "And who is this dearheart?" The kind older Italian woman asked.
"That's my niece, Elly." Meg said, not missing a beat she turned back to Franny. "Is detective Vecchio here or not?"
"Ahhhhh, no."
Meg sighed a deep, frustrated, sigh. "Alright Elly. We should go." She said, her voice hadn't lost it's edge, but Ma Vecchio, who was an extremely sensitive woman could hear the weariness in it.
"No, you can't leave yet, you've just got here!" She said, actually leaving the kitchen doorway. "Here dearie, give me you're cote. Sit down, have some coffee."
"Thank you, but I really couldn't trouble you. Come on Elly."
"No trouble. You're a guest in my house. You're not going back into that cold until you've warmed up some." Meg was about to protest, but Mrs. Vecchio pulled out her secret weapon. Turning to Elly she said, "Come here sweety, we'll make some hot chocolate, and I have scarpachi cookies baking in the oven, how does that sound."
All weekend Meg had succumb to the large green eyes of her niece and standing in the warm Vecchio home she was too tiered to start saying no. So Elly scurried into the Kitchen and Meg took of her coat, was given a seat on the couch and waited for Ray.
She hadn't been waiting long when Tony came bounding down the stairs two at a time. "Franchescaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!" He yelled, "Where's that money, I need it!"
"JUST WAIT!" Franny's voice called from the hallway. Meg was amazed that Fraser spent a fair amount of his free time in this household and hadn't gone deaf.
Tony wandered into the living room and was about to plop on the couch when he noticed there was a ridged, lovely, woman already there. "Hay." He grunted, it was supposed to be a greeting, but it didn't come off well.
Meg wasn't sure how to respond to that.
He must have sensed her uneasiness because he extended a hand and said. "I'm Tony."
Meg looked at the hand, with grease under the finger nails and lots of little burns from cigarettes. She was much to tiered to deal with dirty people. She knew that made her spoiled a snob and a bitch and someone she couldn't really justify being, but regardless, she just looked at the hands and said. "Inspector Thatcher," by way of introduction.
Tony smiled down at her, an odd smile, mainly because his teeth were much cleaner than the rest of him. "Dragon Lady, huh? Here to see Ray?"
"Dragon Lady?"
"Ok, Ray's on his way." Franny said as she walked into the room. "You're pretty lucky. He was actually losing and . . . Tony! What are you doing in here?"
"Me and the Dragon Lady were just talking."
"Does she look like she wants to talk to you?"
"Who are you to tell me who she want's to talk to? This is my house too you know, I can talk to any damn person under its roof!"
"No Swearing!" Ma Vecchio yelled from the kitchen as she carried out a tray with a couple of steaming mugs, filled with coffee, and a platter of fresh-out-of-the-oven cookies. "Now let's all sit and drink some coffee as we wait for Ray."
"Ma, he's only three houses away. How long do you think it's gonna take him to get here?"
Not fast enough, Meg thought. But she didn't say anything.
"Antie Meg, you should see her refrigerator. It has about a million pictures on it! She has the biggest family ever."
Ma Vecchio laughed. "No, sweetie, our family's a normal size. You should talk to Rebecca Alonzo. She has the biggest family of anyone I know. Twelve children, forty two grandchildren."
"Oh!" Fanny said excitedly, nearly spilling the cup of coffee as she handed it to Meg. "That reminds me I heard that Julia Malago is pregnant."
Ma Vecchio muttered something in Italian and quickly crossed herself. "That girl, she's not even married."
"Yha, well I also heard that she and her boyfriend, you know Charlie, the kid that used to sweep outside the grocery when we would walk to the bakers, anyway, their getting married next month."
This fact obviously upset Mrs. Vecchio. "We shouldn't talk about these things in fount of guest." She said graciously. "So what do you do at the consulate?"
Meg suddenly found her mouth extremely dry. She was terrified of these people, they were so alien, she didn't know how to talk to them, she didn't know what they expected to hear. "I manage the consulate." She managed to spit out.
"What exactly is a consulate anyways?" Tony asked. "Is it like an embassy or something."
Meg took a drink of Coffee, it was very good, but her mouth was still dry. "It's similar, while an embassy is mainly concerned with diplomatic interests, a consulate deals with commerce."
"So if I were a Canadian and I needed American money, I'd go to the consulate?" Franny asked.
"Yes, we do provide that service."
"So then how come Fraser's always off with Ray doing" she moved her hands vaguely, as if she were going to pull a word out of the air. "Stuff."
Meg shook her head slightly. "I have no idea."
That's when Ray burst in. "Damn it's cold!" He yelled to no one in particular as he slammed the door shut. Then, still yelling he walked into the family room. "Ok, this better be good because I was about to clean up."
"Oh, pleas!" Franny muttered, rolling her eyes.
When Ray entered the living room he was shocked to say the least. There was his family, he saintly mother, his slob of a brother-in-law, a little girl didn't look at long enough to figure out she wasn't related to him, his kid sister whom no one additive could truly describe, Diefenbaker the supposedly deaf wolf, and there right in the middle was Inspector Margaret Thatcher. The only thing he could think to say was, "Where's Benny?"
Meg put her mug on a coaster and stood up. She had been sitting still in that room too long, with people she just didn't know how to deal with. Finally, a person, and a situation that she was prepared for. "You have no idea where he is?"
"Does he have any idea where you are?"
"I need to find him so I can give back his wolf."
"He left Dief with you." That made a little more sense to Ray.
"I can't keep him in my apartment or the consulate, and I can hardly let him lose to wander the streets."
"Why can't you keep him in you're apartment?" Ray asked. Fraser had obviously left Dief with the Inspector to protect her. Ray wasn't about to let Fraser down by accepting responsibility for the wolf.
"No pets. Look detective, if you don't know where he is can you at least suggest some places I might look?"
"You try his apartment?"
"I called three times."
"He got a phone?"
"I called Mr. Mustaffie."
"And."
"He's not in."
"The consulate?"
"Checked there."
"The dinner, three blocks west . . ."
"Checked there."
Ray found himself racking his brains. "The station house."
"Checked there, they were less then helpful." Ray could just imagine the guys who worked the night shift stonewalling her and hitting on her at the same time.
"He's just probably out on a walk or something." Ray said, knowing it was less than helpful. "You know, it's nice and cold, reminds him of home."
Meg sighed and nodded. "Could you keep Diefenbaker here, until we find Fraser?"
"No," Ray said quickly because he didn't have a good reason not too. Meg seemed to suspect that, she glared at him with skeptical eyes. "You see my sister Maria, she's . . . allergic to dogs. And, ah, if theirs one in the house she'll just, ah, brake into hives and sneezing. Not pretty."
"Ray what are you talking about?" His mother demanded. The question was on Tony and Franny's lips too, but his mother got it out first.
"I'll explain later ma." He said in his man-of-the-house voice, which no one could dispute.
Meg knew it was a lie. She knew that for some reason, which she naturally assumed was selfish, Ray wouldn't take in the wolf. She gave the detective a harsh look that sent chills through his body then she called out. "Elly, we have to go."
"Are we going to go home?"
"Not quite yet sweetie."
"I'm tiered."
"I know, finish up you're hot chocolate."
"I don't want the rest."
Meg took a deep breath and walked into the middle of the room, scooped the half-asleep child up and headed to the door. She paused before Mrs. Vecchio. "Thank you so much for you're hospitality."
"Any time dear." Ma said earnestly.
Before Ray could think to react, Meg was out the door and walking down the driveway with determination, checking ever so often to make sure that Dief was behind her. "You could say here for a little while, I could make some calls . . ."
"No thank you detective." She called back, as she placed the drowsy child into the car with conspicuous Canadian flags on it. "I wouldn't want you to inconvenience yourself."
As she pulled away from the curb Ray slammed the door again. "Damn!" Only this time it was soft, so his mother wouldn't scold him. Only Franny heard.
"What?" She asked.
"Nothing," he muttered. "Never mind."
"Never mind? Fraser's boss just drops in for coffee, then you throw her out, then you beg her to stay? What's up Ray? You got a thing for her?"
Ray just laughed at the shear stupidity of the comment. That coupled with the oddness of the event and the threat that was unrealized all struck him as really funny. "No Franny. I don't got a thing for her."
"Really? 'Cuse I like her."
"Oh, you do? Really?"
"Well . . . yha. She's got this aura, you know."
Ray grunted. "Aura, I wonder if that's what Fraser sees in her."
That caught Franny's ear. "What Fraser sees in her? What is that supposed to mean?"
"It means what it means, now will you let me alone, I gotta make some calls."
Franny wanted to push it, but could tell that it wasn't a good time. That was fine though, she could wait.
To Be Continued . . . .